Note: This transcript was exported from the video version of this episode, and

00:00:00:01 - 00:00:21:04
Bob Searns
A tour of the pyramid of getting these things done is having good public policy, you know, advocating for walkability and quiet streets and speed limits and safe pedestrian crossings. And then what you need to do, I think, is round up champions who are going to take this through the process. And a lot of times those are business leaders.

00:00:21:07 - 00:00:38:19
Bob Searns
They may be politicians who are going to give you some wind at your back when you go to the various agency people. I mentioned think beyond silos, thinking build partnerships with people in the health community. That's got to be a huge emphasis.

00:00:38:21 - 00:01:02:21
John Simmerman
Hey, everyone, welcome to the Active Towns Channel. My name is John Simmerman, and that is Bob Searns, the author of the recent book Beyond Greenways The Next Step for City Trails and Walking Routes, published by Island Press. We have a fabulous conversation and I can't wait to share it with you, so let's get right to it with Bob.

00:01:02:23 - 00:01:06:25
John Simmerman
Bob Searns, thank you so much for joining me in the Active Towns podcast.

00:01:06:27 - 00:01:09:28
Bob Searns
thank you, John. It's great to be with you. Thanks.

00:01:10:00 - 00:01:20:03
John Simmerman
Well, Bob, one of the things that I love doing with the After Towns podcast is giving my guests an opportunity just to quickly introduce themselves. So who is Bob Stearns?

00:01:20:05 - 00:01:47:13
Bob Searns
Well, a lot of things right now. At this point in my life, I'm a bar band musician by night, and I have taken up a new career as an aspiring writer by day. And kind of going back before that, I have been a I like to call it a developer of greenways, Urban greenways trails, open space, conservation projects, things along that line.

00:01:47:14 - 00:02:13:27
Bob Searns
I did that for about, God, four or five decades really now. So that's that's my background. And when I say developer, what I mean is that somebody who puts an idea together, maybe producer's a better word, puts an idea together and then gets a plan, goes out and finds the money, secures the right away, organizes teams and gets projects built.

00:02:13:29 - 00:02:24:25
Bob Searns
So as I say, I've done that for a whole lot of decades and that that's where I'm at now and what I what I have been doing.

00:02:24:27 - 00:02:31:23
John Simmerman
Fantastic. Okay, well, you slip something in there that sounded fun. Tell me more about the musician stuff.

00:02:31:25 - 00:03:04:17
Bob Searns
Well, yeah, I own about 15. Well, longer. I started playing guitar and bass in high school, and about 15 years ago, I kind of fell in with some other musicians, and we put together a classic blues, delta blues and classic American rock band. And we play in the various entertainment venues, the bars, pubs, restaurants and that sort of thing around, you know, the Denver metro area.

00:03:04:19 - 00:03:08:05
Bob Searns
And it's a lot of fun. It's a lot of fun doing that.

00:03:08:07 - 00:03:26:26
John Simmerman
Fantastic. That's great. Yeah, before we hit the record, but I was telling you a little bit about that. I have a pretty deep history with the different range area. There. I lived in Boulder for about a decade and for a few years I worked in downtown Denver and would ride the Express bus, you know, down to downtown Denver and all that.

00:03:26:26 - 00:03:51:26
John Simmerman
So I'm sure the front range of the Boulder Denver area will come up in our conversations. But one of the things and the reason why we are chatting today is because from that experience that you've had and the work that you had been doing previously in developing and putting together a greenways and pathways and things like that, you have published a fabulous new book.

00:03:51:28 - 00:03:59:24
John Simmerman
Talk a little bit about the inspiration behind this book, Beyond Greenways, the next step for City Trails and Walking Routes.

00:03:59:27 - 00:04:18:18
Bob Searns
Yeah, the inspiration came from a few places. It was kind of a point in my life, so, you know, maybe it was actually six, seven years ago. As I mentioned, I've been building trails in greenways for a whole lot of years and I kind of wondered, what are some next step? You know, where do I want to go?

00:04:18:18 - 00:04:56:11
Bob Searns
What do I want to do with it? And I happened to be invited to a Trails conference, an international conference on Jeju Island, which is a maui sized island off the coast of South Korea. It's part of South Korea. And at the conference, there was an emphasis on creating walking routes. And really even more exciting than that is Catch You has a loop trail that goes around the edges of the island that's, you know, a couple hundred miles really long where the island meets the seashore.

00:04:56:12 - 00:05:14:18
Bob Searns
So on one side you got kind of the wilderness of the sea, and the other side you have a number of towns and hamlets along the way so you can walk from place to place, spend the night. There's even what they call them, these grannies, the term they use that run the B and B's where you can stay.

00:05:14:21 - 00:05:54:20
Bob Searns
And I just got really inspired by that idea as I was trying to figure out, well, what's the next direction for me and maybe for greenways? And so that notion of the walking route inspired me. I took it back to Denver with me and actually got together with a number of friends and two dogs. And we walked. We decided to walk around the edges of Denver to kind of map out a to island type route, you know, maybe 150 mile route around the edges of metropolitan Denver, where the city meets the countryside to see what that would be like.

00:05:54:22 - 00:06:28:14
Bob Searns
And connected with that, there's another another prong to this. This two pronged approach is around that time, I was also wrapping up a plan for Commerce City, Colorado, which is a well, it was largely a working class suburb just on the north east side of Denver. And they had a project we called it the Walk by Tip Plan and a number of health people is actually Tri-County Health this time sponsored this.

00:06:28:14 - 00:06:54:11
Bob Searns
And in their emphasis, you know, part of it was recreation, of course, but a big part of it was health and fitness and dealing with kind of the the it's almost the epidemic proportion. Well, this is an epidemic proportion of of obesity and cardiovascular problems and and all those kinds of things that were coming from a sedentary lifestyle.

00:06:54:13 - 00:07:19:24
Bob Searns
So that journey was to figure out how to promote routine, you know, day to day fitness activity, to get people healthier. And there was kind of an a pivotal moment at that. At one of the public meetings, two older ladies from the community came up and they said to me, we just want a place to walk, you know, where we can we don't have to dodge garbage cans in the street.

00:07:19:24 - 00:07:52:00
Bob Searns
We don't have to dodge bicyclists coming past us at a high speed on a bike path. This is nothing negative about bikes, but this is the kind of space they wanted. Just that tranquil setting of readily accessible clothes and walking. So that kind of was the second part of the epiphany. So in addition to the grand walk around Denver, my wife and I and sometimes my kids, we would get together and we would walk these loops in town, in the suburbs and the different communities in the urban area.

00:07:52:02 - 00:08:15:25
Bob Searns
And we would walk these 3 to 6 mile walk through urban areas. And the geometry was always a loop, you know, kind of starting out, going around an area point to point and coming back to the point of beginning. So those two components became kind of what I started to think about in some of my urban planning and Greenway planning I'd done before.

00:08:15:27 - 00:08:51:00
Bob Searns
On a number of occasions, we had proposed loop around the edges of community use as part of a trail plan, but I decided to kind of brand that as grand loops, the ones around the outer edges like Jeju Island are the one. We walked around Denver and then the ones in town I called Town Walk, and so that came together as kind of these two elements of this kind of a little bit new geometry of greenways, greenways tend and rail trails tend to follow the grain of the environment.

00:08:51:02 - 00:09:18:01
Bob Searns
You know, they follow a stream valley or a rail quarter. They're linear, they tend to be grade separated, whereas loops, you know, really almost go against the grain, you overlay them and the geometry of the loop is more important. And in a way the idea was to expand and make accessibility more equitable to places to walk. Biking can be part of it, too.

00:09:18:01 - 00:09:33:03
Bob Searns
I'm not I'm not dissing bicycling, but at least you could just go out with a pair of shoes or your bare feet if you want. You didn't need any special equipment to kind of use these kinds of facilities. So that's that's how it evolved.

00:09:33:05 - 00:10:04:00
John Simmerman
Yeah. I'm pausing on this particular image because this image, more than any of the others, really sort of brings that experience that you had in South Korea on the island to life. In my mind, as I was reading it, I'm going then I saw this. I'm like, yeah, that's kind of like what Bob was talking about. It was like this, you know, relatively narrow sort of walking environment, natural surface, maybe not completely, but, you know, much of the way.

00:10:04:03 - 00:10:24:18
John Simmerman
And so I think that this is a really nice image to kind of set this up is that, yes, there's a lot of flexibility that we'll be talking about, like with these grand loops and these city walks where you're going to have a multitude of different surfaces. But yeah, that initial seed, this this image sort of, you know, popped in my mind.

00:10:24:21 - 00:10:28:16
John Simmerman
Is that kind of a relatively close assumption There?

00:10:28:18 - 00:10:56:03
Bob Searns
Yeah, I'm glad you put that image up, John, because when I say walking, you know, walking is defined as a number of types of movement. And typically in writing the book, I interviewed runners, you know, extreme athletes. And so it really implies any kind of foot movement on a path or even traveling with enabled with a wheelchair to write.

00:10:56:03 - 00:11:08:06
John Simmerman
Yeah, I was just going to mention that too, because that's one of the one of the things that we talk about on the Active Towns Channel a lot is, is, you know, in all ages and all abilities sort of approach to things within reason obviously.

00:11:08:06 - 00:11:15:24
Bob Searns
Yeah, Yeah. I considered rolling along with a wheelchair or using other types of assistive devices walking as well, Right?

00:11:15:26 - 00:11:42:04
John Simmerman
Yeah. Okay, good. Just want to make sure we clarify that. Yeah. Fantastic. So yeah, and, and really, I want to come to what you have described as, you know, these two elements and you just mentioned the grand loop trails and also the town walks and there's I hadn't realized that you had done a grand loop trail around Denver.

00:11:42:09 - 00:11:45:08
John Simmerman
Now that that has to be a big loop.

00:11:45:10 - 00:11:47:24
Bob Searns
Well, we didn't. We haven't built it yet.

00:11:47:27 - 00:11:49:00
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah, I know, But.

00:11:49:00 - 00:11:49:28
Bob Searns
You guys, you guys.

00:11:49:29 - 00:11:55:13
John Simmerman
Have, like, figured it out. Yeah. Yeah. How many miles would that be all around Denver.

00:11:55:15 - 00:12:23:15
Bob Searns
it could vary from 120 to 150 or longer. I actually did do a concept plan. The Colorado Parks Foundation very in the Greenway Foundation of Denver, very kindly gave me a grant and I did write up a concept plan. And actually this, this loop around Denver is by and large, significantly in place. It's partly by happenstance. It's also partly in the process of developing the concept plan.

00:12:23:15 - 00:12:47:17
Bob Searns
I went out to all the jurisdictions around Denver and talked to the people there, and they all pretty much enthusiastically embraced the idea of connectivity. And it turns out that these this loop is sort of happening even without a grand master plan. There's a concept plan that I did, but I say 40% of it is in place is a it's very walkable trails and other parts.

00:12:47:17 - 00:12:57:24
Bob Searns
You're walking on country roads, but you can go out right now and walk all the way around the edges because we did it, you know, just just like we did. It can be done.

00:12:57:27 - 00:13:19:13
John Simmerman
And I think that's a good thing to to interject is that yeah, it's because you made the comment, we haven't built it yet, but at the same time you can link these things together and that's kind of a little bit about the spirit of the book, is it? It's it's sort of half of a cookbook for for how you can plan these out and then build them when you need to build them.

00:13:19:20 - 00:13:26:26
John Simmerman
But in in, in another way, it's like, by the way, you could probably go out and do a good portion of this, if not the entire thing.

00:13:26:26 - 00:13:46:09
Bob Searns
Now yeah, there's different levels of, of development from just an idea that people go out and walk to something that's formally in place. I might add that when I started working on the book and started researching this and talking to people about it, you know, I thought, this is a crazy idea. But then I discovered there's one around Phenix, they're building one around Las Vegas.

00:13:46:12 - 00:14:08:07
Bob Searns
There's one in development around Louisville, Kentucky, and Paris is talking about a loop. So actually, you know, people were building these before. You know, this idea came to my head. So it turned out there are a number of places that are actually doing it. So in some ways, I'm also documenting in the book people who have done this or are working on doing this.

00:14:08:10 - 00:14:36:22
John Simmerman
Right? Yeah, Yeah, absolutely. And the the other thing that is identified in mentioned here on this slide is, again, what you had mentioned as well are more these these town walks and these loops that you're doing within the the neighborhoods. And again, this is something that in in many cases, most cases you can probably cobble this together already with what's in your neighborhood.

00:14:36:25 - 00:14:58:28
Bob Searns
That's that's kind of the the beauty of it is that you can do that. There's different levels that I thought about for town walks. And by the way, other people have done those too. Before I even thought about it, I just put a brand on it. But one of the things about this is that ideally you're shooting for a high quality experience like the picture shows.

00:14:58:28 - 00:15:20:09
Bob Searns
That shows the key characteristics of a complete street where you see a nice walking surface, you see a tree median, there's shade, it's a great experience. There's separation from the traffic. So that's kind of the ideal of what it can be. But there's also a lot of flexibility in the same way you can walk in a lot of ways.

00:15:20:09 - 00:15:43:02
Bob Searns
You can walk on a back street in our back street, but a local street in a community too. So yeah, I think that that that that was kind of that was sort of the ideal town walk. And I also see those as overly parks in a way. They're at different levels like community or local or neighborhood. You can can do these branded walks in the same way.

00:15:43:05 - 00:16:06:13
John Simmerman
Yeah. And the way you were describing, you know, the the city walks in the little neighborhood walks and everything definitely fits into your diagram here of the grand loop trail configuration we have. You know, obviously, when you look at, you know, where the city meets the countryside and in creating that grand loop, you're on the edges there ideally.

00:16:06:16 - 00:16:33:00
John Simmerman
And in interestingly enough I can tell is through reading the book to that. Again, there's a good likelihood that some of this infrastructure, if not a lot of this infrastructure, is already built because you get lots of of trails out on the fringes out there as well as as you just mentioned, maybe it's a quieter farm road or country road or out there on the edge.

00:16:33:02 - 00:16:49:18
John Simmerman
But one of the things that's really cool, too, is this daisy chain kind of look of it here down in the bottom right of this graphic is where you might be able to loop some of those neighborhood loops into a grand loop configuration and scheme.

00:16:49:21 - 00:17:11:28
Bob Searns
Yeah, not a bad idea, actually. You know, I mentioned I was I was kind of promoting the idea of a grand loop around Denver. I went to the city of Boulder Open Space Department and made a presentation, and one of the planners there came up and suggested that idea of those loops. And then it was also added to a presented somewhere else.

00:17:11:28 - 00:17:35:05
Bob Searns
And a mountain biker advocate came up and said, It really be nice if we maybe had a little attached mountain biking loops or maybe equestrian loops that were attached. So that's how that that daisy chain evolved is by taking this idea on the road and getting input from people like Boulder, you know, Boulder, Open Space and some of the mountain biking organizations.

00:17:35:07 - 00:18:10:09
John Simmerman
Yeah, Yeah. And it's interesting, too, the one of my very dear friends there in Boulder is Darcy Kitching. And so she has actually written a book, The Best Urban Hiking Guides for Boulder. And then every year with part of her walking group that she she has there in, in Boulder, she which is kind of a spinoff of the Walk to Connect group that Jonathan you know, had there.

00:18:10:12 - 00:18:10:24
Bob Searns
And.

00:18:10:26 - 00:18:41:18
John Simmerman
Yeah yeah yeah exactly. And so one of the annual events that Darcy puts together with her walking group and it may might actually be identified and highlighted in this particular best Urban Hikes book that was published by the Colorado Mountain Club Press is a walk through 60 around the entire entirety of Boulder. And so they have a route that they've done every year annually for the past, I want to say four or five years.

00:18:41:21 - 00:19:11:19
John Simmerman
I've actually joined them one of the years and filmed the entire event. So that's available out here on the YouTube channel. So folks, if you haven't watch that, be sure to check that out. It's a lot of fun. Yeah, but what's really neat is, is it's bringing to life exactly what you were highlighting in the book is that, you know, it was cobbled together with kind of what is on there and what's brilliant about it because it it does something similar in that it's many different types of trails, types of pathways.

00:19:11:19 - 00:19:39:05
John Simmerman
Sometimes you're on a quiet street, but you're able to to actually adjust it based on, hey, what's going to be the most pleasurable route versus what's going to just get the job done. So I think that's rather brilliant in terms of how you framed it and and also the spirit of, well, if that connection's not here yet, okay, how do we get the community together or get some support behind?

00:19:39:08 - 00:19:53:09
John Simmerman
Okay, well, how do we how do we close this gap so that we could create this rather meaningful either grand loop or city walk that, you know, residents and visitors alike will really enjoy?

00:19:53:12 - 00:20:15:00
Bob Searns
Yeah, I think they're she's kind of she's hit on the citizens starting point I think of a lot of these kinds of things that you can maybe and there's urban hiking organizations too you start maybe with a semi virtual semi established thing and that image gets there and then you can upgrade it over time. But but I'm glad you mentioned the experiences.

00:20:15:00 - 00:20:21:16
Bob Searns
The safety and the experience are the two leading things, I think, in thinking about these.

00:20:21:18 - 00:20:48:18
John Simmerman
Yeah, Yeah. And it is interesting too, that you've mentioned the Paris and the Calais there that they have developed over the many, many years there. I was just there in November of last year and had the opportunity to explore quite a few of the extensive network of trails that they've been putting together. And so I do have some videos that I have produced on that.

00:20:48:20 - 00:21:03:03
John Simmerman
And in this, this particular image really highlights the fact that they're converting a lot of their old abandoned rail areas to be able to facilitate those, you know, those experiences.

00:21:03:05 - 00:21:20:05
Bob Searns
Yeah, this one could really be something. It's not built yet, but it's a strong advocacy movement. There's some resistance like anything, but I really hope they do achieve that. I think that would be a wonderful amenity, an overlay kind of regional park really, for for Paris. It'd be wonderful.

00:21:20:07 - 00:22:07:19
John Simmerman
Yeah. Yeah. So when we are in fact, let's go ahead and pull this out because I think believe believe this is the image of Paris in that. Yeah. So that's a right right there. Yeah. That is fantastic. I'm relatively certain that I have been on portions of it that have already been developed at this point, and they really do see it as like a chain of, of greenways that connect other parks and speak to that a little bit because I think that's a part of what you were addressing in the book as well, is this could be an opportunity against the grain to be able to connect many other green spaces as well as, you

00:22:07:19 - 00:22:12:26
John Simmerman
know, other key destinations like shopping areas and other places like that.

00:22:12:28 - 00:22:57:01
Bob Searns
Yeah, that's that's another as you say, it's a key element of thinking about this in the experience. And there's different terms that different designers have used places and links is one of them. I like to call them waypoints also that you know, on a loop like that, when you showed around Paris or the one they're proposing around downtown Denver or one of the one we talked about, the grand loop is that maybe with a certain spacing of maybe an hour's walk or whatever, even less, you go from an open space to another open space, or maybe from a civic or iconic view to another destination like that.

00:22:57:08 - 00:23:24:12
Bob Searns
But it could also be more rudimentary kind of destinations, like maybe it's just the coffee shop where you can reward yourself or a restaurant. You know, you walk around a loop, you get all that exercise you can kind of eat with impunity. So I think you always have to think about these just kind of a term bracelet and having those little mini destinations along the way to make these kinds of loops really work.

00:23:24:14 - 00:23:28:25
Bob Searns
It's a nice, organized piece of entertainment.

00:23:28:27 - 00:23:58:07
John Simmerman
Yeah. And this image really drives home for me. Part of the reason why you're you're even considering this and this is this is not unique to the front range of Colorado. I many other places around the world are noticing that a big part of our challenge is that our desirable outdoor destiny options are getting increasingly crowded, as well as just the less than desirable experience even getting there.

00:23:58:15 - 00:24:12:08
John Simmerman
And so creating more opportunities within our own communities to be able to, as you mentioned earlier, just outside your door, being able to access some meaningful, pleasurable experiences that you can walk on.

00:24:12:10 - 00:24:33:13
Bob Searns
Yeah, you know, it's both convenient access and equitable access that it gives more people, you know, ideally these the grand loops are at the end of the transit lines and there's been a Transit to Trails program in a number of cities where you can take public transportation and get out to the edge and be in kind of a semi wild kind of place.

00:24:33:13 - 00:25:02:19
Bob Searns
Or you can, you know, the rideshare services, I've kind of utilized them in my walk. So and the time element just as it's more convenient to get out there as well. And there's one other factor I'll throw in about that when you're doing a loop around the edges of a city, for example, there's there's another genre of what's called ultralight hiking where you don't need a backpack and fancy, heavy, expensive equipment.

00:25:02:19 - 00:25:23:18
Bob Searns
It's these are daypack walks, but they can be treks because many times on the edges of cities, you have little towns and hamlets and other places where there's A, B and B or a campground or a place where you can spend the night. There are restaurants along the way or convenience stores. So, you know, you want to carry some water.

00:25:23:18 - 00:25:40:02
Bob Searns
And I can go into more detail about all of that, what you carry with you. But you're able to have sort of a semi wilderness experience without carrying a £60 backpack and freeze dried food and all that. Not that I'm knocking the alternative. It's lightweight travel.

00:25:40:05 - 00:26:09:10
John Simmerman
Yeah, well, I'm glad you mentioned that too. But not only just the lightweight travel concept, but also how you outline this in the book, how you are leveraging those other mobility services, whether it's transit or rideshare, to be able to cobble together, you know, that experience for you. And that's another good thing to point out too, especially with some of these grand loop ideas.

00:26:09:10 - 00:26:28:14
John Simmerman
Maybe a person decides to, you know, I'm going to walk the whole way around Denver, Colorado, or wherever, but you don't do it all necessarily in one go. Maybe you do a segment of it and then say, okay, cool. You know, I put in my 8 hours of or 6 hours or 4 hours or whatever you want to do for that day.

00:26:28:16 - 00:26:50:05
John Simmerman
And you either jump on transit or, you know, hail a cab slash ride share, or maybe a friend picks you up or something and you can actually, you know, have that sense of adventure of being able to cobble something together without, as you mentioned, you know, necessarily having to, you know, carry enough gear to be able to camp overnight.

00:26:50:06 - 00:26:54:16
John Simmerman
Again, nothing wrong with that. But, you know, this gives you a little bit more flexibility.

00:26:54:18 - 00:27:21:12
Bob Searns
Yeah, it's just it's a lightweight way to go. And, you know, I think there's a tourism aspect to it. If you if you imagine, you know, we talked about the loop in Paris or a loop around London or somewhere, it's maybe you go and you take a trek and maybe it's maybe you take, well, I did one around Buffalo I'll talk about later, but you walk around the whole city and you've come there from you live in Denver, you've gone to London.

00:27:21:12 - 00:27:43:19
Bob Searns
It's a way to experience the English countryside. And maybe you stay in places all the way around. In fact, there's just a story in The New York Times about a woman who just put out a guidebook to doing these loop walks in London. But you can you can just take a backpack and even spend the night all the way around or like you said, or or go into town each day and then come back again.

00:27:43:22 - 00:28:24:13
John Simmerman
Yeah, Yeah. And I want to hone in and emphasize the fact that, you know, what we are again talking about here is, you know, creating that network of locally accessible paths and trails. And again, in many cases they may be out there already and it's just a matter of linking them together, you know, and basically highly citing the fact that, did you know, by the way, you can access this and being able to identify which ones are going to be truly accessible, you know, for all ages and abilities and as you're phrasing it here, a diverse, equitable access approach to things.

00:28:24:16 - 00:28:50:21
Bob Searns
Yeah. Yeah. And it's just in some ways it's about coaxing these routes out of the environment, finding them, and maybe you maybe you have to improve a segment or there's a big barrier somewhere. Maybe it's just simply like a freeway. Maybe it's just crossing that barrier with with a pedestrian bridge or something in that that opens up maybe 50 miles of new territory because you cross the one barrier, you know.

00:28:50:21 - 00:28:58:12
Bob Searns
So that's part of that coaxing out process of these creating these types of amenities.

00:28:58:15 - 00:29:29:27
John Simmerman
Yeah. And getting back to that experience, creating experience that is really pleasurable and enjoyable and and I think really kind of helps to, you know, separate this from just a utilitarian pathway that may not be the most enjoyable environment, but it gets the job done. And, you know, from an active mobility perspective, it's like, yeah, okay, this is a pathway next to an interstate and you know, it is not a very pleasurable experience.

00:29:30:00 - 00:29:53:24
John Simmerman
But this particular diagram that you have in the book really I think helped identify and highlight how incredibly important it is to to have a good understanding of what the pathways of perception are and the stuff that's happening at the fine brain, as well as the things that are further out, like the skylines and the long views.

00:29:53:26 - 00:30:35:11
Bob Searns
Right? Yeah, I think if if you're going to lay something like this out, the key is to get inside the head of the user, which means really you really need to go out there and walk it and use your five senses less to sound like smell like look like. Well, and the thing I began to learn when I was doing these walks around Denver and some of the places and in my Greenway planning all over the country is that if you can create a space, even if there's a steel mill, you know, maybe a quarter mile away, if you can create some tree cover and some canopy and screen, you can have a different experience

00:30:35:11 - 00:31:01:23
Bob Searns
that you can feel like you're in a wild area. And and I learned that from my Greenway work, too, that as I was saying, those are the kinds of things you can do. And in addition, you do want to find those opportunities for those long views, those vistas. You want to try and preserve those as well. But don't be inhibited by the fact that a portion of the trail might go through something that's not always a beautiful wilderness.

00:31:01:23 - 00:31:27:22
Bob Searns
In fact, part of what I learned and this walk around Buffalo I'll talk about later, I learned that it's kind of nice to have that variety of kind of those rural experiences. And then maybe you go through an urban scape where there's even there's graffiti on the wall that might be interesting. You know, there's there's different it's really it's like composing a song or writing a book or a movie.

00:31:27:22 - 00:31:47:28
Bob Searns
It's really a series of experiences that are entertaining, entertaining. And I'd say I'm more in the entertainment business than the transportation business, not that I haven't been involved in, you know, trying to promote alternative active travel, but the emphasis of Beyond Greenways is really entertainment.

00:31:48:00 - 00:32:01:24
John Simmerman
Yeah, And you just mentioned that you did just do a trek around Buffalo, New York. Talk a little bit about the inspiration for wanting to do this, because this is just recently this is just a couple of months ago, right?

00:32:01:24 - 00:32:25:06
Bob Searns
Yeah, Yeah. Well, when I, when I finished the book in chapter eight, this book, I did a series of thought Explorer experiments. And I know there's some that exist in some cities, but I wanted to try to overlay the idea on some other communities of different character and location to see what you could imagine and so Buffalo is, you know, it's a Rust Belt city.

00:32:25:06 - 00:32:47:24
Bob Searns
It's kind of emerging from a you know, the nickname is the City of No Illusions. For many years it was just kind of, who would want to go to Buffalo? And so I said, well, let's let's look at Buffalo and see what you could do. And I discovered that there's some really beautiful iconic places around the edges, Buffalo, not the least of which is Niagara Falls, I might add.

00:32:47:26 - 00:33:26:01
Bob Searns
So I kind of plotted out a thought experiment, Experiment And then after the book came out, I said, Well, I better put my feet where my mouth is. So I, I plotted a route and walked all the way around Buffalo turn out. It was about 120 miles. And it was just an incredible experience. I had no idea of the kind of spaces, you know, everybody thinks, it's, you know, steel mill town or whatever, the kind of spaces that are on the edges in a lot of other cities like this Pittsburgh, Boston, all these Detroit, they all have these kind of spaces out on the edges and they're not very hard to get to.

00:33:26:03 - 00:33:46:12
Bob Searns
So I did the walk, walked all the way around, and part of it I spent the night out there are different being beast. As I mentioned, I just carried a day pack. In other instances, I used the rideshare services and I have a nephew who lives there. I went back at night and spent the night at his house and then went back out to the loop again and walked the next day.

00:33:46:15 - 00:33:52:25
Bob Searns
So it was kind of a combination of that way of getting all the way around Buffalo Fantastic.

00:33:52:25 - 00:34:22:00
John Simmerman
And we see a couple of collages of some of the beautiful images that she had, you know, from that. And then we shift in to, you know, some of the lessons learned. We'll we'll get to that in just a bit. But I want to reflect on the fact that I did something similar. But on a bike, the last time I was in Buffalo was for the Congress for the New Urbanism annual gathering was in Buffalo a few years back.

00:34:22:03 - 00:34:49:13
John Simmerman
And my good friend Victor Dover and I decided that we would go for a bike ride. And so we rode our bikes from Buffalo to Chautauqua. And so because the original Chautauqua in New York is, is there within riding distance of, of of Buffalo. And it was just really fascinating to see, you know you know you go through the grittiness of that you know rust industrial portion you get to the edge and then you get out into the countryside.

00:34:49:13 - 00:35:10:24
John Simmerman
And we went through several little villages and towns and whether you're you're doing a slow bike ride like we were doing because we're not going very fast or you're going for a walk, a part of the part of that process as part of that experience, you called it entertainment, but I can even say it's even more rich than that.

00:35:10:24 - 00:35:32:21
John Simmerman
It's an experience you're experiencing life at a slower pace. You know, Jonathan with walked in it you know, emphasizes that you're you're feeling as life at three miles per hour is very, very intimate what you see. Talk a little bit about that because I think that also kind of goes into some of the things that we're going to see here.

00:35:32:21 - 00:35:40:22
John Simmerman
On the lessons learned is that you are experiencing this at a much more intimate rate in pace.

00:35:40:24 - 00:36:06:03
Bob Searns
yeah. And you know, the entertainment part taking I'm being a little lightweight on that. It really is a spiritual and meditative experience. Just, you know, when you get into walking, there's just that repetitive motion that kind of gets the serotonin loop going in your head in the meditation. You know, a lot of the meditative kind of religion involves kind of a repetitive chant or a repetitive motion.

00:36:06:05 - 00:36:30:27
Bob Searns
So you kind of get in that kind of mindset inside your body that you clear your mind, plus the space you're in, you know, you know, especially in the rural areas, but it can be in an urban area to the sense the sound. So, yeah, it's really way beyond just entertainment. It is. It is it is a mental experience and a spiritual experience.

00:36:30:27 - 00:36:58:21
Bob Searns
And of course, we know there are spiritual trails like that, like the Camino de Santiago that goes, you know, goes across northern Spain. And then there's the Kumano Kodo, which is a religious kind of meditative trail in Japan, in kind of the hill country south of Osaka. So there are a number of these kinds of destinations. And I'm actually planning to write a piece about spiritual trail, maybe linking together.

00:36:58:24 - 00:37:24:06
Bob Searns
I noticed an article about these prayer houses in the Southeast. And what if you linked those together? There are these places they started in the slavery era and then in the black community they remained where people would gather for spiritual gatherings. But what if you start to link these historic places together? So there's all these different types of levels and pilgrimage trips that are part of it?

00:37:24:09 - 00:37:50:17
John Simmerman
Yeah. Now we're on the lessons learned slide here and, and I find it a I haven't a question about this this particular slide given the context of of this slide right here saying we're going to all right, we're going to walk the talk here. We're going to get out there and do it. We've written the book. Did you have any surprises, any additions to the bullet points in lessons learned after you did the book, The Buffalo?

00:37:50:20 - 00:38:09:08
Bob Searns
yeah. This is why I urge planners, go out and walk your route. Yeah. Don't. Don't just put it on a map. Yeah. There were a number of lessons. Obviously. The first one when I plotted this thing, you know, the devil is always in the details, you know? So what? I started doing it. Google Maps. It would have been very hard to do it without Google Maps.

00:38:09:08 - 00:38:30:02
Bob Searns
I tried on a paper map too. But the nice thing about Google Maps is that you can kind of find those waypoints that I mentioned earlier, you know, because when you go on a trip like this on foot particularly, and I'm just some old guy walking alone, you know, you got to find places to drink, to sleep, to duck out of a storm, comes.

00:38:30:04 - 00:38:48:27
Bob Searns
And what a lot of people don't think about is you have to go to the bathroom. You know what? What what are you going to do? And, you know, these days, sadly, in America, other countries, maybe it's a little different. You can't just safely, comfortably go knock on someone's store. You need to plot those things. And Google Maps really helps with that.

00:38:48:27 - 00:39:08:29
Bob Searns
I, I call that the Tim Hortons planning technique. Tim Hortons is kind of the they're popular in Buffalo. They're kind of the buffalo equivalent of Starbucks. But I started finding all the Tim Hortons and connecting them together because I knew that Tim Hortons you could go get coffee or, you know, something to eat or and use the bathroom.

00:39:08:29 - 00:39:32:01
Bob Searns
So it turned out I didn't actually, I don't anybody Tim Hortons get mad at me and it didn't actually go into any Tim Hortons. But I just because there are other ways I solve the problem but just knowing they were there gave me that, that way of plotting a route and Google helped me find those. I would just put coffee shops in or restaurants in and then I would find those.

00:39:32:07 - 00:39:55:18
Bob Searns
I also found in speaking for myself, there are other people who might want to go longer. I'm in pretty good shape, but you know, a 10 to 12 mile walk is pretty optimal. When I was training for this I walk you you'll you'll know this I live in the Tim corollary you walk to golden 15 miles it was 90 degree weather and I was really hurting at the end of that walk.

00:39:55:18 - 00:40:20:21
Bob Searns
And you know, just because it was a little too long in the heat. So I began to find for me as a lay kind of hiker, you know, ten, 12 miles is probably optimal. And it's it's leisurely. You could stop and rest along the way and that kind of thing. I did 116 mile length when I did the Buffalo Walk, but I found a 10 to 12 miles was nice.

00:40:20:23 - 00:40:42:29
Bob Searns
And then you just kind of hunker down for the night wherever you're going to stay and just enjoy and relish the day. So that was very helpful. The other thing I'll add, as I mentioned, waypoints, is that if you plot one of these, you really want to figure those out and they give you kind or there's kind of the beginning of the journey in the morning in the end, at the end of the day.

00:40:43:01 - 00:41:12:27
Bob Searns
But these little maybe it's a church or maybe it's iconic site or overlook, they give you something to do each hour to kind of do it. And then the technology, the ride share technology, a lot of this kind of thing wouldn't be possible. Or is it would be possible? It wouldn't have been as easy to. This is now because of things like Lyft and Uber, which I use the lot, because then you can just the end of the day, you start training or whatever you call and go back to where you're staying if you have to.

00:41:12:27 - 00:41:38:14
Bob Searns
I, you know, I tried to not use those facilities. If I could get somewhere on foot, but I had that out. The one thing I learned that surprised me and disappointed me a little bit is country roads can at least around Buffalo can be busy. So you need to anticipate that we we my nephew walked with me for some of this when I say we we always walked facing the traffic so we could see the cars coming so I didn't see don't think it was very dangerous.

00:41:38:14 - 00:41:58:04
Bob Searns
We could see them coming but sometimes the some of the roads, the roads, that noise was a little bit of an annoyance. And so ultimately, it'd be nice to in Buffalo and I've talked to people in Buffalo to eventually provide separated trails that parallel these routes. Other places there are lots of back roads. It depends on the community.

00:41:58:06 - 00:42:16:03
Bob Searns
And then, you know, just little things like checking, you know, a lot of lodging places you can't check in until three. So and you got to check out by ten or 11. So you got to put that into your equation, too, to not get somewhere too early. Cell phone, an extra battery. If you're going to do this. Yeah.

00:42:16:03 - 00:42:37:00
Bob Searns
You want to carry that because you're that you're kind of your life can be dependent on having that cell phone and the prepping the trek. I tried to get my weight down to £15. You know, actually the heaviest thing was water. So that was a real learning experience in doing the sit in, you know, getting out there on foot and walking buffalo.

00:42:37:02 - 00:43:01:27
Bob Searns
And then we talked about the idea of the experience that being a high quality experience in that it doesn't always have to be green, it can be these urban spaces as well. We talked about destinations and waypoints. I like to think of sometimes in terms of character districts. They're different rooms that you walk through. Grant Jones He's just a wonderful landscape architect too.

00:43:02:00 - 00:43:37:20
Bob Searns
He's the first guy I heard use that term that maybe you're walking through kind of a very green space or, you know, an industrial space. You can actually begin to name those districts if you're plotting with these different bubbles that you walk through that have different character and safety And security is pretty obvious, I hope. But you want to consider whether when you think about that, it's key and, you know, and then, of course, as I mentioned, the Tim Hortons theory, that or the 7-Eleven theory that you think about where you're going to get your positions and find toilets, you know.

00:43:37:20 - 00:43:40:09
Bob Searns
So yeah, those are some things.

00:43:40:12 - 00:44:13:02
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it really is interesting. There is a couple more things, you know, on this in terms of planning of the route. And one of the things that I think is really important here is I'm with you. I think it would be wonderful if we saw more of those sort of parallel routes to some of these country roads, because some of these are just absolutely delightful spaces that they're going through.

00:44:13:02 - 00:44:43:07
John Simmerman
But yeah, especially with the pressure of exurban sprawl and developments happening, you're seeing more and more motor vehicles on there. So being able to have a North Street version, which is what I run into a lot in the Netherlands, is that, you know, pretty much anywhere I want to go, any city I know that I can jump on my bike or walk or run, you know, from a village to a village on a separated pathway.

00:44:43:09 - 00:45:02:05
John Simmerman
You know, in sometimes it's parallel to the train track, sometimes it's parallel to a country road. But yeah, it's something that I think North America would be well-served to have because oftentimes there's the right of way, sometimes there's not, but oftentimes there is. It would be nice to have an off street version.

00:45:02:07 - 00:45:19:02
Bob Searns
yeah. I think, you know, it's a policy kind of thing that we need, policy that promotes walking everywhere. And, you know, one of the things I noticed walking around Buffalo there, I was the only one walking in the road. There are a lot of other people, locals who are walking in route and it should be just a policy when you lay out a road.

00:45:19:02 - 00:45:38:16
Bob Searns
It's not just for the cars provide that separated space for travel and allow for bike travel to you know to to do that. You know, the other things that are showing up on the slide, I think is the you know and this is Buffalo Creek in that picture. I didn't even know about Buffalo Creek. I just happened to cross a bridge.

00:45:38:16 - 00:46:13:28
Bob Searns
I said, wow. But I realize this particular creek quarter, there are a number of like this. Those could be linked along the way and not only for maybe having a trail, but also to the the planners and designers in the buffalo areas to think about preserving these areas become part of you know the greenbelt though. So it's a sort of when you see those take advantage of them but but unlike a greenway string maybe several of them together into a loop in which you know, in story the same thing.

00:46:13:28 - 00:46:18:28
Bob Searns
Lake Erie. Sure. You know, it's another opportunity there.

00:46:19:00 - 00:46:46:17
John Simmerman
Yeah. Yeah. The other thing that I think is important to and I'm gonna pull this up the adapt existing infrastructure slide because one of the things that you just said about you know, talking about, you know, the political will and the policies in place to be able to, you know, provide a separated facilities, we do realize that oftentimes we will have a situation where we're walking in the street.

00:46:46:17 - 00:47:16:10
John Simmerman
I mean, I live in a neighborhood that was platted out in the 1920s, 1930s, and was built out in the 1940s immediately after World War Two. So we have no sidewalks. And so every street is a shared street and we're kind of cool with that at this point because everybody is so used to walking in the street and running in the street and riding bikes in the streets and walking your dogs in the street, that it's a it's a traffic calming environment.

00:47:16:10 - 00:47:35:15
John Simmerman
And so the motor vehicle drivers in the neighborhood know that. yeah, I mean, I if I go down this stretch on Garner, I'm going to, you know, come across at least 10 to 12 people walking in the neighborhood, which really reminds me of the image that we see here on the left in this is adapting and using the infrastructure.

00:47:35:17 - 00:47:55:03
John Simmerman
But context is incredibly important because two blocks over, I have, you know, a classic strode in Lamar Boulevard and no one would walk here. There's actually sidewalks there, but you wouldn't even want to walk there because it's a you know, a very unattractive environment. Hostile environment.

00:47:55:06 - 00:48:19:10
Bob Searns
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that and I think that pictures that happens to be in Denver, but those kind of streets are all over the place where I call them walkable streets. And that's where I think we need to think in terms of working with the different disciplines. I happened to discover this street, working with a traffic engineer. She and I went out and walked, you know, and she walks, you know, with her baby.

00:48:19:10 - 00:48:42:09
Bob Searns
She walked there all the time. We're carrying the stroller. I mean, so when you can take advantage of a street like that, but there's a whole bunch of things you got to think about when you do that. You know, traffic speeds, traffic volumes. One thing I discovered in Buffalo, too, that I was walking the streets, but I noticed that the cars coming toward me would swerve way too much.

00:48:42:09 - 00:49:01:07
Bob Searns
But they did the courtesy, the courteous one somewhat almost come right at me. And I worried about them because they'd go into the other lane. So you need to you need to be consulting. I think with the traffic congestion years in thinking about that. On the other hand, these walkable streets are, you know, that other shop was walking around Denver.

00:49:01:07 - 00:49:31:09
Bob Searns
There's all kinds of places where you can do that very easily. So it's part of that planning process. But but it also the beauty of it is in many ways, when we think beyond greenways, these are much more flexible than a traditional greenway that usually has to be engineered as a ten foot wide height bike path for a whole bunch of legal and design reasons versus the more flexible opportunity that might be here.

00:49:31:12 - 00:49:40:19
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. Is there anything that we haven't yet covered that you really want to leave the audience with?

00:49:40:22 - 00:50:06:27
Bob Searns
You know, I think it's it's been a good overview. I guess I come back to two things. This one, just emphasizing again the, the experience and getting out and walking and making sure that it is a great experience for those people who are planning them for themselves or for for other people. And the other one is how you get these things built.

00:50:06:29 - 00:50:31:17
Bob Searns
There's there's a process for that. I've kind of learned in the Greenway business, you know, as my friend Mark Fenton, who is he was the host of the PBS series America Walks, he about the core of the pyramid of getting these things done as having good public policy, you know, advocating for walkability and quiet streets and speed limits and safe pedestrian crossings.

00:50:31:19 - 00:50:58:28
Bob Searns
So I think those those policies are important. And then the next thing I think is, is if you want to get these kinds of things built, don't don't be discouraged. Start with a process. Put together an image or a vision of what you want to see happen. Put a mission statement together. It's an elevator statement that kind of describes and I kind of lay this out in the book, you know what you want to do and then kind of make an attractive package that can convey this.

00:50:58:28 - 00:51:21:14
Bob Searns
And then what you need to do, I think, is round up champions who are going to take this through the process. And a lot of times those are business leaders. They may politicians who are going to give you some wind at your back when you go to the various agency people I mentioned think beyond fail thinking, build partnerships with people in the health community.

00:51:21:17 - 00:51:42:05
Bob Searns
That's got to be a huge emphasis, you know, to get these things done and then build some viral that set an example and figure out a way to make those spread and also cite examples of where people have done them successfully. Other places and talked the money too, that they do bring in a financial return for the investment.

00:51:42:08 - 00:51:44:24
Bob Searns
So I would emphasize those kinds of things.

00:51:44:26 - 00:51:58:07
John Simmerman
Yeah. Would you think back to examples that are out there in North America specifically? Are there any that sort of bubble up?

00:51:58:09 - 00:52:32:24
Bob Searns
Well, yeah, there's one. It's my favorite and it's the Turquoise Trail in Tucson. And that is a trail where it was two ladies with the historic group there. And they found some turquoise, turquoise paint that the city had left over for something. And they were somehow able to persuade the city to get one of their street, you know, white line painters to take paint and paint a stripe on the sidewalks in the old part, historic part of Tucson.

00:52:32:24 - 00:52:58:14
Bob Searns
That's the loop that goes around that area, through the old barrios, past the Spanish colonial architecture structures. It stops at some piazzas and restaurants. And we have some friends that live in Tucson that told me about this when we first walked in and we went out and walked it. And it was such a great way to experience all there.

00:52:58:14 - 00:53:23:16
Bob Searns
There it is all to look at how simple it is. You know, obviously they thought about the experience so they designed something that was a comfortable walk that had all kinds of points of interest. And so I encourage people that, you know, to go do that. But that's one of the examples that pops into my mind of sort of the one that bubbles up.

00:53:23:16 - 00:53:50:00
Bob Searns
The other one that's kind of and I haven't actually walked it yet, is the Maricopa Trail around Phenix, because that's one of the first ran loops that goes for hundreds of miles around Phenix, Arizona, and it connects together the various county parks and open spaces. And so those are a couple models that just just jump out to me as examples of grand loops and town walks that exist right now.

00:53:50:03 - 00:54:11:21
Bob Searns
Now, Denver is planning one that might cost $100 million, which is just going to be kind of a deluxe version, which is awesome around downtown Denver. yeah. And think about the connections to sometimes it's just a simple connection, particularly with cul de sac type types of communities. The policy should say those calls in a cul de sac should have pedestrian connections.

00:54:11:23 - 00:54:21:10
Bob Searns
So if you want to visit the person, the house behind you, you don't have to drive five miles to get to them. You can just walk through a, you know, a connection like the one shown in the picture.

00:54:21:12 - 00:54:49:09
John Simmerman
Yeah, I laugh when I see these because it's just it's so simple, it's so brilliant. And I've had the opportunity to live in a couple of different cul de sacs over my adult life. And and we always had pathways like this. We always had, you know, you know, little connectors. In fact, there in Colorado, the house that I owned in Iowa, we had a nice little walkway it would punch through.

00:54:49:09 - 00:55:04:24
John Simmerman
And I've documented many such passed through and cut through is in cul de sacs in Boulder, too. And so it really just opens up the possibility to be able to use existing infrastructure and still have it be car free.

00:55:04:26 - 00:55:23:21
Bob Searns
Yeah. And that there really needs to be a requirement upfront in the codes, as Mark Trenton said in the policies, because building what you see in the picture would be impossible once the place is built. Because if you don't have those easements, people are going to say, not in my backyard, but if it's built, they love it, you know, So.

00:55:23:23 - 00:55:31:13
John Simmerman
And I don't I don't blame them because, you know, at that point, if it's already built in, it's not only is it not in my backyard, you're taking my backyard.

00:55:31:15 - 00:55:42:04
Bob Searns
Yeah, exactly. Is that making their property more valuable, having those connections in the end? At the end of the day. But you got to do it upfront. It's got to be in the in the plans before they're approved.

00:55:42:07 - 00:55:53:21
John Simmerman
Yeah, Yeah. No, I hear you. So one of the things that you wanted me to make sure to highlight, of course, was America Trails American Trails, talked a little bit about this.

00:55:53:23 - 00:56:15:14
Bob Searns
yeah. They're are wonderful organizations. Maybe I'm biased. I served as chairman of the Board of American Trails for a number of years. I think they're the global go to source for trails and walking and all that kind of information. And so it's you know if you go to their resource page and, they have they have wonderful webinars that they do.

00:56:15:17 - 00:56:40:22
Bob Searns
I posted a number of them to learn about all the aspects of trails. So that's one good source. I think, to get information and about the kind of things that I'm advocating to. They they've partnered up with my publisher, Island Press, sponsoring webinars that sort of thing. So that's another good source. The other source I was going to mention and Plug is LinkedIn is a way to list.

00:56:40:23 - 00:57:05:14
Bob Searns
This really worked for me. I'm not on the other social media sites, but I am on LinkedIn. And if you kind of start connecting with people in the areas that you're interested in, the posts have just been amazing that I've been finding through my, you know, my resources there. So those are those are two things. Maybe I'm eccentric, but those are two resources that I like so that I like.

00:57:05:16 - 00:57:24:11
John Simmerman
Yeah. And I and in fact, I, I have your, your LinkedIn page, you know, pulled up here. And so, yeah, folks, this is a great way to connect with Bob and be able to see what he's doing and stay on top of the things that you're posting because I'm glad that you found LinkedIn because you know, for active towns, same thing.

00:57:24:13 - 00:57:48:01
John Simmerman
I make sure that I do post all of my new content out to LinkedIn and there's a lot of wonderful dialog that's happening out on this platform. So I'm really glad that you have found it and you're out there as well. I also do want to pop on over to the website for your your your book here on Island Press.

00:57:48:01 - 00:58:16:26
John Simmerman
Again, folks, be sure to pick up your own copy of Beyond Greenways. And I do have the book out on my bookstore on the Active Towns Bookstore. And so it's listed right here under my featured authors. Again, I tend to interview quite a few folks who have written books. And so right there is the book as well. So Bob, it has been an absolute joy and pleasure having this conversation with you today.

00:58:16:28 - 00:58:18:03
John Simmerman
Thank you so much.

00:58:18:05 - 00:58:22:28
Bob Searns
Yeah. And you have a you have a great day and thank you very much for getting the word out.

00:58:23:01 - 00:58:37:07
John Simmerman
Hey, everyone. I hope you enjoyed that episode with Bob Stearns. And if you did, please give it a thumbs up. Leave a comment down below and share it with a friend. And if you haven't done so already, I'd be honored to have you subscribe to the channel. Just click on the subscription button down below and ring that notifications bell.

00:58:37:13 - 00:59:01:14
John Simmerman
And if you're enjoying this content here on the Active Towns Channel, please consider supporting my efforts. There's many ways to do so. Easiest way is just to go to active towns dot org and click on the support button. And by the way, Patreon supporters get an extra added benefit of receiving this content ad free and early each week, so please consider becoming a patriot and supporter.

00:59:01:20 - 00:59:28:25
John Simmerman
And again, thank you so much for tuning in. It's always wonderful to have you along for the ride. Well, until next time as John signing off by wishing you much activity, health and happiness cheers and again sending a huge thank you to all my active towns Ambassadors supporting the channel on Patron Buy me a coffee YouTube super. Thanks as well as making contributions to the nonprofit and purchasing things from the active town store, every little bit adds up and it's much appreciated.

00:59:28:27 - 00:59:30:04
John Simmerman
Thank you all much.